Future Of Rhetoric In Our Electronic Age
Brandon Hornbarger
Embry Riddle Aeronautical University
FUTURE OF RHETORIC IN OUR ELECTRONIC AGE
Rhetoric in The Electronic Age
Introduction
Rhetoric refers to the art of public speaking. It is the art of developing the persuasive
language use and effective expression (Manovich, 2001). Whenever people are making use of
language, whether written or spoken, they are engaging in rhetoric acts. From prehistoric
Greece to the late Nineteenth Century, speech-making was considered a significant element
of Western education to instruct writers and unrestricted speakers to convince listeners to
actions with squabbles. The turn of the Twentieth Century saw a weighty interest of rhetorical
research beginning to progress in the organization of divisions of speech and rhetoric at
universities and colleges. It also saw the progression of international and national specialized
organizations. A few contemporary theorists suppose that it was essential to restore the
interest of the research of rhetoric following renewed significance of persuasion and language
in the gradually withdrawn surrounding of the 20th Century through the 21st Century
(Warnick, 2005). This also became necessary with the focus of the media on the huge
discriminations and evaluation of outcomes of political rhetorics. Thanks to the spreading out
of advertising and mass media such as telegraphy, film, radio, and photography, rhetoric is
once again being more remarkably put across into the lives of individuals.
Every time people use language, their intent is to communicate a message or attain an
objective. This means that any sort of communication results into rhetoric and every time
people communicate, they act rhetorically. It is the ability of one to convince other
individuals in his/her notions. In spite of its heritage as an ethical manner of opinion, speech-
making has come to take on unconstructive hints (Zappen, 2005). In the recent years, people
have failed to understand exact postulation of rhetoric is and has managed to somewhat
accuse that this particular word is untenable. Currently the media uses rhetoric in a rather
offensive manner, particularly on political issues and policies relating to the same.
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Brief History of Rhetoric
According to a majority of scholars and movements that have frequently defined and
contributed to the progression of the research, rhetoric has its roots in Greece. The core line
of Greek rhetoric was expanded by Roman rhetoricians such as Quintilian and Cicero (Porter,
2009). Being a methodical learning, rhetoric was developed by a set of orators, advocates,
and educators called Sophists. It is believed that the Sophist’s perspective on rhetoric may
have been the flicker that led to the ignition of today’s worldwide misunderstanding on the
connotation behind rhetoric. This group of individuals saw perceived rhetoric as a tool for
combining enjoyment with the government. The individuals further supposed that words had
the medicating capability to the audience. During this time, rhetoric became a talent whose
demand was ever expressive and it started to change to a unenthusiastic tone as Plato’s
disapprovals became overly well-known. Commonly available prehistoric example of
offensive rhetoric word can be traced back to Platos notion about the sophists (Fogg, 2003).
Plato, who was a disciple of Socrates acknowledged learners, most of the times , depicted
this group of individuals as highly talented writers who made the most of deceptive language
techniques to not only influence, but also convince audiences. Moreover, his hypothesis on
Sophism also repeated in the course of Socrates’ works, had its foundation on the trickery,
greed, mistrust and trepidation for the right thing (Manovich, 2001).
Interestingly, these people were capable of manipulating speech to make the worst
situation appear manageable. At the inception and expansion of christianity in the middle eras
following the defeat of the Roman Empire, communities degan linking rhetorics with fancy
or expressive, lacking any general notion nor knowledge. At this time, church did not believe
that expressiveness was a significant aspect to communication and speech, thus led to the
diminishing of rhetoric and depreciative view. At the turn of the Sixteenth Century, rhetoric
had been re-energized even though a few key intellectuals continued to pass verdict on it.
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One reformer even questioned rhetoric by suggesting that it was a form of verbal enrichment
and an outcome of little consequence (Warnick, 2005). As he commended dialect while
calling speech-making into derogative statements, rhetoric missed its speculative impact and
once again was, perceived as nothing more than a prejudiced, sophisticated speech
instrument. On the other hand, language became a non-partisan instrument for distributing
some results of other subjects, and was never seen in the light of being the foundation of an
art type that has been digested by a learned individual for its own sake.
Major Movements and Theorists and Their Contributions to the Understanding of
Rhetoric.
Key theorists and movements have in the recent years allowed for the expansion of
people’s current understanding of rhetoric. As already indicated above, Sophism is one of the
movements that contributed to the understanding of rhetoric. It began in the 5th Century with
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